These past few weeks I've been pondering the list of nominees that NASCAR has put forth for the selection of its inaugural Hall of Fame class.

The twenty some men that the panel have chosen are certainly worthy and it must have been a most difficult paring down from the original list of hundreds. So difficult that the only other option I could suggest would be...make the list bigger!

Certainly each and every one of the men nominated this year will one day grace the halls of the new building in Charlotte, but NASCAR needs to squeeze as much drama as possible out of these first few elections lest the interest fades. We, and NASCAR, know that a good debate will keep interest high for decades to come.

At first glance, the list looks like a no brainer. After mulling over my choices before voting at NASCAR's fan ballot page, my choices grew more and more troublesome with every pick.

Where is Bruton Smith? The old axiom goes; "Without resistance there can be no progress", and Mr. Smith has certainly offered up plenty of complimentary "resistance" to three generations of France family members over the years. Not retired? Neither are Chidress or Hendrick, I'm appalled that Bruton missed the cut here.

If Richie Evans was an obvious choice, why not Jerry Cook? Or Ray Hendrick? Or Sam Ard and Jack Ingram?

Kudos to the panel for tossing us a bone in Evans but...no Bugs Stevens? The Modified Tour and Late Models paid the bills in the early days of NASCAR, maybe right up to the late '60s. If you think Richard Petty's 27 wins in '67 was something, Geoff Bodine nailed 55 checkers in one season!

No Mark Martin? Oh, wait, he hasn't retired yet...but he HAS retired from the Bush Grand National/Nationwide Series right?

Perhaps the domination of the Nationwide Series counts as a negative when considering Martin's career as a NASCAR driver. In my opinion, that success only adds to Martin's NASCAR legacy and opens the door for Jack Ingram and Sam Ard to be considered in the top 25 as well.

I might be biased but, those guys should be in the hunt!

I'm going to weigh in with my perspective now, before I change my mind in a day or so. Hopefully I'll move you to consider a different approach to this dilemma, and you'll pitch in your two cents as well.

The No Brainers

There shouldn't even be a debate or an election for these NASCAR legends, Bill France Sr., Richard Petty, David Pearson, Dale Earnhardt and Red Byron.

Byron because he was the first champion and generations of fans should use his first ballot induction as a learning experience. As a new uninitiated fan, when you look at Red Byron's record, you would immediately ask "why this guy?".

Being the first champion would lead new fans to dig into NASCAR's history and Byron's story would be a jumping off point for a new fan's appreciation of the sport's roots.

Earnhardt because he was in the right place at the right time and millions of NASCAR fans see his legacy intertwined with the sport's rise to prominence and popularity.

It was ol' Ironhead who made stock car racing a media event, rather than a sideshow on ABC's Wide World of Sports. NASCAR is in the same class as the NFL, NBA, MLB and NHL, and we can look back and see it's rise in the public's awareness perfectly synchronized with Earnhardt's aura and stature expanding into mythological proportions.

Earnhardt also took the souvenir business to it's most extreme level...every driver/team in NASCAR should give thanks to Dale, if only for that big ol' trailer full of T-Shirts and die-cast cars out there in the parking lot.

In importance to NASCRs legacy, Richard Petty and David Pearson are interchangeable in my mind, but as I so emphatically stated, I am very biased. I was born and raised in the Carolina Piedmont...the NORTH Carolina Piedmont, but I had an affinity for racers from south of the border. I think those early '60s Labor Day trips had something to do with it.

Despite living a couple of hours from Level Cross, I adopted David Pearson, and Cale Yarborough, as my home boys. I kept that to myself. It wasn't until moving to Delaware, and out of my father's house that I could come out publicly in support of South Carolinian drivers.

As far as racing records go...Petty and Pearson are equals. Their head to head racing records speak for themselves, and are pretty much even up in results. It's a lot like comparing Payton Manning to Tom Brady...like opening a can of worms that can never be completely closed again. I leave the research up to the readers but, the two are inseparable in my mind.

Bill France Sr. should be the first and only NASCAR Hall of Fame inductee elected...last year. If one is anything more than a casual fan of NASCAR, then Bill Sr.'s life story is already ingrained in your mind down to the last detail.

Personally, I've had enough. Let's talk drivers, let's debate Wood, Moore and Johnson as owners/innovators, let's argue Late Models and their place in NASCAR lore. Let's put Bill France Sr. in and move on.

The Gimmes

If it wasn't for the top five, we could argue these guys for days on end; Bobby Allison, Cale Yarborough, Darrell Waltrip, Lee Petty and Junior Johnson.

Junior and Lee could (should?) be in the top five...but it's already full. That's how important they were to NASCAR's history and success.

Bobby, Cale and Darrell are in a tight bunch on the win list, if not championships won. This will be a great debate come 2010!

The Great Unknowns

Richie Evans, Bud Moore, Glen Wood, Herb Thomas and Buck Baker.

I cast a vote for Richie Evans at the NASCAR Hall of Fame website when I finally made my picks last week.

I was born and raised a "Modified Guy". The Southern 500 Grand National race may have been our biggest trip back in the '60s, but the old Dogwood and Cardinal Modified races at Martinsville were the biggest "events" of the season on our calendar.

I'll expound on that later, but...where are the rest of the Modified stars? Who overlooked the guys that paid NASCAR's bills by racing two, three or four times a week? Hmmm...somebody dropped the ball this time.

Bud Moore "invented" the modern Grand National/Winston Cup/Nextel Cup/Sprint Cup chassis. Bud Moore accomplished a lot more than that but, when your brainchild becomes a sports foundation for over 40 years, you deserve more than a pat on the back.

Glen Wood choreographed the modern team, pit crew and front office blueprint that all NASCAR teams use today. My grandparents were born in Stuart, Virginia in the late 1800s, I've been to the bottom of that mountain and seen the original shop sitting by the river there in the middle of town. The history of Wood Brothers Racing screams NASCAR. They can do no wrong in my eyes.

Herb Thomas was a winner, NASCAR's first two time champion and #5 on the average top 5 finish list. 48 wins is a Hall of Fame stat.

Buck Baker another two time champion and the first back to back winner, his numbers parallel Thomas'. Vastly underrated as a racer and owner. Any guy that would race an Oldsmobile Cutlass against the Hemis and Cammer Fords in the sixties deserves a look.

The Get In Line Guys

These racers are worthy but there is so much hype ahead of them, they MUST take a back seat;

Tim Flock and Curtis Turner were NASCAR's first real media stars...and wild men. It helped Flock's PR that there were two more Flocks, Fonty and Bob, racing at the same time, and the monkey didn't hurt one bit either. Can you imagine Jimmy Johnson driving with a monkey in the #48?

Turner was NASCAR's bad boy and Bill France Sr.'s nemesis from day one. He got the Charlotte track rolling, had alleged mob ties, landed airplanes outside liquor stores, and survived banishment from racing. He MUST have been pretty important regardless of his seemingly so-so stats and numbers.

Ned Jarrett is a lock as a two time champion and a winner of 50 races. I remember a blogger writing that ol' Ned really wasn't all that because he had only one "super speedway" win and most of his victories came on dirt short tracks. That really teed me off, that's a lack of historical awareness right there. That's like saying Ty Cobb wasn't all that because he hit very few homeruns.

Jarrett's biggest contribution to NASCAR's legacy was his television presence. Ned Jarret was the first full time, champion racer to make the transition to the broadcaster's booth. In my opinion, we could bump Jarret up to "The Great Unknowns" and get away with it.

Glenn "Fireball" Roberts is a sentimental choice and a worthy one. He was just reaching his prime when he died horribly on the track in an era when
Grand National racing was still very regional and generally isolated in the South. Roberts became a local legend. He was quite a character; equal to Turner and Flock...we just never got to see his potential fulfilled.

Joe Weatherly has the same mystique as Roberts, deadly racing accidents and unfulfilled promise. Roberts and Weatherly were certainly skilled racers but we never got to see how far their skill sets could have taken them. Both Weatherly's and Robert's deaths led to improvements in safety equipment and better built race cars, but, as in Earnhardt's case...at what price?

 The Question Marks?

I'll dump most of the "owners" here: Hendrick, Childress and Parks. I'll throw in Bill France Jr. and Benny Parsons too.

Benny Parsons did more with mediocre race cars than practically any NASCAR racer past or present.

I judge a stock car driver's legacy and performance by his Top 5 percentage rate. I mean, that what running for a Cup is all about right? Top 5's mean EVERYTHING to a driver running for a championship.

Benny Parsons sits in 24th place in Top 5 percentage...ALL-TIME. If you look at the 23 drivers ahead of Benny, all but two will get a NASCAR Hall of Fame nod in the next 10 years. Now, look at the cars Benny drove!

That's enough for me, but BP will get even more votes because of his announcing career. There could not have been a better ambassador for NASCAR on television than Benny Parsons.

Raymond Parks should be way higher on my list than this. If I had any sense, I'd have him in the "Gimmes", but as my ex would testify, "Sense? He has none".

Parks was the prototype for the modern team. I'm sure that everyone learned a thing or two from watching Parks and Red Vogt set up cars, and I'm sure that knowledge was passed on from team to team. Bob Flock, Fonty Flock and Curtis Turner also drove for Parks ans they became legends in their day.

I do not agree with Rick Hendrick and Richard Childress being included in these first 25 nominees. Nothing against them but this should be for "inactive" participants only.

The key to being a Hall of Fame race car owner is to have the same high skill set as the top dawg salesman on a used car lot.

If we're going to throw Hendrick and Childress in then why not Jack Roush? Yeah, yeah, I don't want to hear it...NONE of these guys should be here before a multitude of other, more worthy Hall of Fame nominees.

Bill France Jr.?

Whatever. Just do it...do it now and get it over with so we can move on to the drivers, owners and mechanics that made the sport worth watching for 60 some years.

So, those are my evaluations of who belongs, when they get in, and in the case of the bottom three, why they shouldn't be considered ahead of Bobby Isaac, Rex White and Marvin Panch. Whoa!

What are your thoughts? What order would you induct these racing luminaries of NASCAR?

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